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Genetically Modified Mosquito

Have you heard the news? Scientists have created genetically modified mosquitos in an attempt to help control the mosquito population. Because mosquitos carry such a variety of diseases, scientists are discovering ways of reducing the population and ways of switching off the gene that allows malaria to survive inside the mosquito. It is a neat trick, but here is what we think of it:

If it takes a lot of REALLY intelligent scientists YEARS of study and millions of dollars worth of equipment to be able to MODIFY the gene code of the lowly mosquito, why can’t these same people see that the One who WROTE the original code and CREATED the incredibly complex insect was REALLY SMART? How can anyone with one eye and half a brain believe the mosquito (or any living organism) evolved by chance over billions of years? II Peter 3 hits it right on the head. The scoffers are WILLINGLY IGNORANT. Like a friend of mine said one time, “They had to have help to be that stupid. They could never have done it on their own!”

Leave84 Responses to testGenetically Modified Mosquito

Ok, then your God was a jerk and evil for creating something like the mosquito, which has been the vector for killing more life on this planet than nearly any other. He forbids us from consuming blood, because it is the “life” yet he created this creature that lives on blood and requires it to produce its eggs. Your God also created the diseases that the lowly mosquito spreads. Why would your God do something like this?

But once again you prove you don’t have the slightest clue what evolution is. Evolution does not occur by chance. Also, the “willingly ignorant” are the ones who would rather follow an ancient error ridden book of folklore and declare it to be definitive than actually look for the truth through science.

The modification is not intended to control the mosquito population. That’s the traditional way of fighting malaria. What the new genetic modification does is destroy the malaria in the mosquito before it can be passed on to humans… it does not harm the mosquito.

As for the time and expense to develop this genetic treatment…. it took all of human history up to about a hundred years ago to figure out powered flight. Molecular biology is far more complicated.

Finally: “How can anyone with one eye and half a brain …. ‘they had to have help to be that stupid.'” Just last month, Eric posted an entry complaining about “name calling.”

How smart was He to create such a horrible insect in the first place? What’s your take on that? Could He not have created it in such a way that it would cause less suffering? I’d say the Scientists are the smart ones, as they’re actually helping the situation.

Has the term IGNORANT changed over time so the KJV translation is now outdated? How about “WILLINGLY DISREGARD” (the Creation and the Flood) for II Peter 3 ?

DNA seems to be the best observable scientific evidence for creation / ID – Law of Information, DNA repair systems, information capacity (2mm diameter sphere full of DNA has a similar capacity to that of 4 million x 1 terrabyte HDDs) etc….

I couldn’t believe the BBC let Richard Dawkins state on TV that the commonality of DNA in all life forms was “evidence for” Darwin’s common ancestry (tree of life). Surely a common designer is a stronger argument here, or, if impartially stated (BBC should be impartial), a feature consistent with both Evolutionism and Creationism.

I’ll let these scientists get back to HACKING the code of the mosquito, and I’ll get back to my successfully HACKED Nintendo Wii & Xbox.

Kenneth Tyner Jennifer and Geno, you are both too funny, sounding like you are both reading from the same science textbook. ##### Geno: At least we are using science textbooks…. ####

Kenneth: The speed of light is not constant due to entropy, and gravity only has one source; the thermal core. Strong and weak forces are proof of entropy. #### Geno: Go ahead and show you have some idea of exactly what “entropy” is. Tell us the unit of measurement for entropy. If you can’t do that, I suggest you have no idea what you’re talking about.

Then you can start showing, with appropriate mathematics exactly how entropy relates to the speed of light. ####

Kenneth: This bears out with the speed in which planets orbit the sun. #### Geno: In the CSE banner at the top of this page, you will find the equation for gravitational force. Please show the factor in that equation that directly relates to entropy or the speed of light. ###

Kenneth: The fastest moving planet is Mercury, which is the closest to the sun. The slowest moving planet is Pluto, which is the farthest from the sun. #### Geno: The equation for gravitational force explains that completely without reference to entropy.

Kenneth: Since light and gravity are both produced by the same EM wave of solar radiation, if gravity slows down due to entropy, then light also slow down due to entropy. #### Geno: So the gravitational force of Mercury is greater than that of Pluto because Mercury is brighter? In a word…. absurd.

“We don’t know what created everything. What we did was chuck your fairytale and start from scratch.”

So you don’t know what created everything, but you’re certain it wasn’t God. You acknowledge the complexity of the universe and all things therein. You observe today that life can’t spring into existence from non-living matter, and matter cannot spring into existence from nothing. You observe that all things tend toward randomness and chaos. You observe all these things but you believe the very opposite happened naturally without any purpose, forethought or planning, and you have ZERO evidence to support it. The following process, I believe, is how you have arrived at your conclusion; 1.) I hate the idea of an all-powerful God who is running the world like it is being ran. Those that claim to know Him are no better than anyone else, and in fact are worse than atheists. 2.) Therefore, He does not exist. 3.) Everything must have come into existence by natural processes being guided by the laws of physics. 4) The laws physics came from… from.. well, they came from nowhere also.. or, we’ll figure that out later, it’s not important.

Am I close? Will you just re-examine or reconsider your original starting point of hating God and mistaking hypocrites for true children of God? If you fix step one, the rest will fall into place for you. You see, creationists observe everything I mentioned earlier and see the necessity of an Eternal God, who created the heavens and the earth will purpose, forethought, and planning. You’re hoping that “science” will figure it all out later, but you are sadly mistaken. It is like Jack Napper said (I can’t believe I’m agreeing with him, let alone quoting him) “The more we learn the more we learn that we don’t know.” And that’s the way the infinite God is… not only are He and His creation beyond what we know, He’s beyond our ability to ever fully know or understand. We will not even be able to plumb the depths of God in eternity. The more knowledge we gain, the more we realize we don’t know much at all. What other choice do you have but to trust the Lord, who knows all and has it all under control?

You keep saying that, but the huge difference is that we believe Someone (as opposed to no one) used the dust as a building block to make Adam. You deride us for believing that God used Adam’s rib to make Eve, but don’t you find it interesting that the human rib will regenerate itself if removed as long as the periosteum is left intact. Did the poor, ignorant, superstitious Bible writers just get lucky on that? or were they doing rib removals back then while leaving the periosteum in place and observing the regrowth? What do you think? There’s another question for you; How could evolution explain the rib regeneration? Were every one of our anscestors having their ribs ripped out (while leaving the periosteum in place) and the one that was able to re-grow the rib survived to reproduce?

“I hate to tell you this, but most Christians have enough common sense to know these stories are allegories. Only a small group of the more naive ones take the whole book as literal truth, and they are rightly mocked.”

I don’t take the entire Bible literally. However, I take it to be entirely true. There are some passages that are even stated by the Bible to be figurative and allegorical, but the Genesis account has no hint of figurative language. It has real, literal people that have several ancient lineages traced directly to them. It is obviously meant to be interpreted literally. It is only when you believe in millions of years that you have to interpret it symbolically. The serpent (Satan) did speak with Eve, but that doesn’t mean he looked exactly like the serpents that we have today. God cursed the serpent to go on his belly and eat dust the rest of the time, so there was apparently some change there. The Bible just doesn’t say exactly what the creature looked like that spoke to Eve. So you can’t just say, “I know what snakes look like today, and they certainly can’t talk, so the whole thing is nonsense!”

“If we still believed as you, we wouldn’t have medicine, space exploration, or any advance we enjoy today. We had a time when your ilk ruled and it was known as the Dark Ages.”

Bilge. Christian creationists are the ones who started the branches of science, and many thousands of scientists are still Christian creationists to this very day.

“Christianity is a con that uses classic brainwashing techniques. You degrade the person’s character and esteem until they are at the bottom, only to lift them again in the warming glow of Jesus.”

Degrading people? Not any more than an oncologist is “degrading” someone by diagnosing their cancer. Doctor: “You have a cancer that is killing you from within and it will surely claim your life if nothing is done about it.” Patient: “How degrading and judgmental of you!” We just speak the truth, Duane, which is sometimes hard to hear, but it will be better for the person in the long run.

“They had to have help to be that stupid. They could never have done it on their own!”

This is so true. Today people are actually being educated to believe lies over the truth. This is being done intentionally.

Teaching people that space is vacuum in contradiction to Genesis is one lie that perpetuates others like the constant speed of light. This further perpetuates the lie of billions of years old universe. It’s one lie built upon another lie.

It is scientifically proven that light has a limited distance in which it can travel. Then how can it be constant. We’re back to “oxymoron”.

If you believe the earth was once a molten ball of lava, lava does’t cool off and become “oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus” does it? As far as I know it cools off and becomes a rock of some sort, though I am no geologist.

“Obviously you’re not a chemist either.”

Well, enlighten me. Where does carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen come from? I know coming from a rock by natural processes sounds ridiculous, but if that’s what you believe, own it with pride man.

“Here you want us to accept your strawman as true. Did I really need to point that out to you?”

I wouldn’t have to make one if you would give me your own description. I bet my strawman for you will be as good or better than your own articulated belief concerning origins (which is why none of you atheists have dared to post one yet.) Why is science looking into origins? Are they obsessed with it?

“Science? No. People? Yes. The more we learn the more we learn that we don’t know… Science is a “they”? I’ve already answered this.”

I was giving Duane a hard time and referencing his use of “science” in his earlier post, so talk to him about that. However, maybe the first thing I’ve ever agreed with you about on this website; “The more we learn the more we learn that we don’t know.” I think you’re right about that. But seriously, that is the crux of the debate; where did we come from? Did no one or someone create us from the elements? Did no one or someone create the elements from nothing?

“The truthful answer is we don’t know YET. You can claim you do but I can claim is was Magic Space Monkeys. Neither claim is supported though. That is unless you’ve been too busy with fallacious arguments trying to make the other side look silly to present it.”

You don’t know, but it certainly wasn’t God… right, I’ve heard you say that before. I think it has been sufficiently demonstrated that not only is it improbable that life, matter, energy, and the laws of physics came into existence from nothing and no one, but that it is categorically impossible that such a thing could have ever happened. This leaves you 2 options; Willful ignorance or becoming a creationist. There’s no other option. And yes, the claim of Jesus being the Creator is adequately supported in the Bible.

However, the magic space monkey thing is actually a pretty good alternative to your rock-to-human theory…

If not, tell us what then so I can ask you, “And where did that come from?” You hate that and belittle it because it leads to the Designer 100% of the time.

“100% of the time? So that means when we ask you where your designer comes from, you are forced to answer that he was designed by another designer, and so on ad finitum?”

The context to my statement was material, physical things. However, “the Designer” is answer to “where did the Designer come from?” The Lord is the Eternal, Self-existent One. He is absolutey independent of everything. He is without beginning and without end… can you comprehend that? I can’t!

“And are you claiming that ANY God would let you into its heaven, no matter which God it is?”

No. There are no other Gods.

“My view is that any reasonable God would judge all of us on our actions”

Have you been reading the Bible? That’s what He says He’s going to do.

“I can’t really do anything to appease an unreasonable God, including one who punishes people for accepting that the world is as it appears to be.”

You mean like people who know that life, matter, and energy can’t come from nothing and so they believe there has to be a Creator? The world appears to be exactly like His Word says… 6000 years old and destroyed by a worldwide flood 4400 years ago. And, no, you cannot appease God. Only Jesus has fulfilled all righteousness and taken the penalty for sin. You may have His righteousness placed to your account if you believe on Him as your Savior and Lord.

“Speak for yourself, Stephen! If you’ve done vile things, that’s for you to worry about. And if we have all been created by one God, then why not say it would have certain duties to us? I have duties to my daughter, I don’t test her or try to fool her or harden her heart.”

God is not trying to fool you. Your own deceitful heart is doing that on its own. He doesn’t actively harden anyone’s heart. All He has to do is NOT intervene and your heart will naturally be hardened because of the sin-bondage that we are in(i.e. Pharoah heart being hardened). The Bible says that our hearts are deceitful above all things and desparately wicked. If God does not intervene, we will get exactly what our degenerate hearts naturally want… NO GOD!

Genesis 1:3And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. 4And God saw the light, that it was good: and God “divided” the light from the darkness.

When God divided the light from darkness, he established the boundary in which light can travel.

For biblical evidence that space is not a vacuum:

Genesis 1:And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the “waters”.

6And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the “waters”, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 7And God made the firmament, and “divided” the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. 8And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

The medium of space is “water”, a clear fluid substance. Possibly a superfluid form of hydrogen.

It’s fine if you want to say there must have been a creator, but it takes evidence to go any further. Stop attacking evolution and start doing creation science. Until then, creation science is just another oxymoron.

DNA seems to be the best observable scientific evidence for creation / ID Law of Information, DNA repair systems, information capacity (2mm diameter sphere full of DNA has a similar capacity to that of 4 million x 1 terrabyte HDDs) etc.

This has to be one of my favorite copy and paste arguments from ignorance. “It’s so complex and I don’t understand , therefore it had to have been designed.”

Law of Information

The what!?! I think you are referring to Dembski’s “Law of Conservation of Information” which was shown to be WRONG!!!! and just plain silly. No recognized theory of information holds such law. I like this one. It’s like the laws of thermodynamics (only one of which Creationists can ever try to remember) only funnier.

I couldn’t believe the BBC let Richard Dawkins state on TV that the commonality of DNA in all life forms was “evidence for” Darwin’s common ancestry (tree of life). Surely a common designer is a stronger argument here, or, if impartially stated (BBC should be impartial), a feature consistent with both Evolutionism and Creationism.

Sorry but Creationists don’t get to argue distinct kinds but permit commonality of all life. What I find funny is that you attribute differences to the SAME DESIGNER.

Here’s some analogies for you.

a red wagon and an airplane Both are form of transportation. Same designer?

Cats and Dogs Both have 4 legs. Same designer? Nope. Different kinds so it must be a different designer

How is DNA evidence of an all-knowing / almighty God? I he was so smart, DNA is not a very intelligent way of creating life. It’s mechanism is flawed at various points. What also wonders me, is why is he reusing parts of DNA (in a paricular order) between different ‘kind’? It doesn’t really give me an impression of intelligence.

A few things i would like to comment on. Mr. Hovind, as a brother i do encourage you to watch your talk when it comes to speaking with unbelievers. Without Jesus, i would be lost myself and would be living out a Romans chapter 1 to a T. I may be saying nothing new to you Eric, but it is only by the Grace of God that someone can know their total depravity so keep that in mind when talking to someone. Now, people are posting comments on this page and the MORALITY card is being thrown around like there is some kind of absolute law of morality that we all seem to need to follow. Chew on this statement…..I can do what is right in my own eyes as well as yours, who are you to tell me what is right and wrong? by what standard do you appeal towards to tell me im wrong? I would like to hash this out further so i encourage comments and i would enjoy responding back by using laws of logic that as an atheist, you cannot account for.

I couldn’t believe the BBC let Richard Dawkins state on TV that the commonality of DNA in all life forms was “evidence for” Darwin’s common ancestry (tree of life). Surely a common designer is a stronger argument here,

Common Designer is a non-argument. While Common Descent has known mechanisms (genetic modification and inheritance), Common Designer has no mechanism.

A fundamental problem with the Common Designer argument is that the stuctures of life are not identical. A Common Designer would, logicially, use parts like Lego blocks and distriuted throughout life. Whereas, what we find is graduation of structures of what would be expected from inheritance.

or, if impartially stated (BBC should be impartial), a feature consistent with both Evolutionism and Creationism.

I loathe how some people treat reality as a matter of opinion where all ideas deserve equal treatment. The BBC is correct not to include the non-scientific ideas of the average American [insert cliche statistic of the ignorance of the average American].

The thing is that animals, or any living organism will be forced to change it’s diet if the environment does not produce the food anymore. In the past the fruit were yielding much more nutrients than now. Just imagine how good a fruit would have been in the garden of Eden or even just after the fall.

Isn’t it strange that the male mosquito has exactly the same ‘deadly’ tools as the female, however is it used to suck blood, or is it used to draw the juices from plants? Now take this in considiration: If the mosquito female could suck juice from a fruit and it would sustain her and the offspring, then God in the first place didn’t create a blood sucking insect. But it was because of mans fall that the whole creaton has gone into a downward spiral from there. Now the only thing that provides enough nutrients for the female mosquito and her offspring is blood……

In many parts of the world we have wintessed organisms change their diets to adapt to new environments. Yes this is God’s creation, but it is a watered down perverted version of the one God first created, and is it God’s fault….no it is mans own fault.

John Bebbington, it would be nice if you actually addressed my points directly without the use of straw man arguments.

I never made any mention to the direction of light. And the moon passing in front of stars of different temperatures makes no difference. The light from neither star will reach your eyes. So the one uncovered first is the one you would see first.

Kenneth, on February 22nd you wrote:

The constant is based on the measurement of a round trip average speed, over a limited distance. Average speed and constant speed are not the same thing.

The greater the temperature of the star emitting EM, the faster light will travel, followed by attenuation (slowing down). The maximum speed of light has never been measured, nor can it be measured.

“A round trip” implies that the speed of light is different in opposite directions. Otherwise, your statement has no meaning.

Furthermore, by your thesis, the light from two stars of different temperature will travel at different speeds. If the light from these two stars is interrupted by the moon crossing in front of it, once the moon moves away the starlight “starts” again at the moon’s distance from the observer on earth as though two torches had suddenly been turned back on.

However, as by your thesis the starlight from the two stars is travelling at different speeds, that from the hotter star must arrive first. Therefore, it will become visible before the starlight from the cooler star.

It is scientifically proven that light has a limited distance in which it can travel. Then how can it be constant. We’re back to “oxymoron”.

Well, I don’t know about the “oxy”. Light continues for ever until something gets in the way of it. In space, it is dust which gets in the way. Space contains a lot of dust so light from distant galaxies travelling through apparent space becomes dimmer because of it – and the inverse square law, of course.

A car travelling along a level road with the engine turned off also moves at a constant speed. And just as you have ignored space dust I am ignoring tyre and air friction.

There was nothing in the link you gave (how did that slip past the censors?) to support your thesis. “Frequency” was not even mentioned whereas “power” (amplitude) was.

The medium of space is “water”, a clear fluid substance. Possibly a superfluid form of hydrogen.

So how come satellites don’t fall out of the sky, stopped by this “fluid”?

Kenneth Tyner The medium of space is “water”, a clear fluid substance. Possibly a superfluid form of hydrogen. #### Geno points out: So all those spacecraft to other planets weren’t travelling thru a vacuum at all. All of the astrophysicists are wrong. All of the physics is wrong. And those spacecraft are traveling thru “water” without any form of friction. Uh-huh.

Kenneth: Here’s some evidence for my above comment: Light can only travel a limited distance based on its frequency.

youtube.com/watch?v=0dTATMEJSuQ

Also, an advertisement that was sent to me: #### Geno: WOW ! ! ! A youtube video and an advertisement ! ! ! That certainly trumps Einstein, Hawking, Feynman, and tens of thousands of other physicists.

I guess Jennifer and I should throw our “textbooks” out and start watching more youtube. ….. NOT.

Thank you, Kenneth, for openly displaying the lack of depth of your understanding of the relevant physics.

The thing is that animals, or any living organism will be forced to change it’s diet if the environment does not produce the food anymore.

Not necessarily. The overwhelming majority of species are extinct. So why isn’t the mosquito extinct?

In the past the fruit were yielding much more nutrients than now. Just imagine how good a fruit would have been in the garden of Eden or even just after the fall.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away. Presumably, back in Adam’s time, an apple a year would have done the trick.

In many parts of the world we have wintessed organisms change their diets to adapt to new environments. Yes this is God’s creation, but it is a watered down perverted version of the one God first created, and is it God’s fault. no it is mans own fault.

So God in his wisdom couldn’t create an insect which could survive without human blood? Such as an ant which lives off its own home-grown fungus, for instance? Or an ant which lives off the sweet juices of the aphid. Or a beetle which consumes dung. Or a bee which lives off flower nectar?

Duane (and John and Andrew), You said: “Your God also created the diseases that the lowly mosquito spreads. Why would your God do something like this?”

You criticise Eric for not understanding your beliefs in one breath and then completely misrepresent his beliefs in the next.

How are we misrepresenting the logic of Eric’s arguments?

As I understand the argument God created the mosquito. God also created the ability of “kinds” to change within limits. Because of Adam’s sin the mosquito changed to live off the blood of humans thereby infecting enormous numbers of youngsters to suffer and die of malaria. If that’s not Eric’s logic you explain what it is as Eric never responds.

Also, Mark, please explain the naturalistic mechanism by which Adam’s disobedience (before he became acquainted with the knowledge of good and evil) caused fruit-eating female mosquitos to mutate into blood-sucking child killers because I don’t know of it and no creationist has ever seen fit to try to explain it.

If you believe the earth was once a molten ball of lava, lava does’t cool off and become “oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus” does it? As far as I know it cools off and becomes a rock of some sort, though I am no geologist.

And you prove you haven’t even an elementary science level understanding of any field everytime you punch a key on the keyboard.

The very fact that you think that these materials were “always there” during this period or that they all must have seeped from the solid matter is just plain laughable. You keep going on about how you are not a geologist but it’s your poor understanding of chemistry that is cause for concern. Leave geology out of it. You seem to wanna confuse the two. Though give the typical Creationists need to lump sciences it’s not surprising.

It comes from everywhere and much of it is all around us. Heck, hydrogen is the most common element in the universe. Did all the hydrogen on the Earth get here only when it was forming? NO.

I know coming from a rock by natural processes sounds ridiculous, but if that’s what you believe, own it with pride man.

So you want me to accept an argument that I know (and has been pointed out to you MANY ANY MANY MANY times) is wrong? Of course when your entire comment is basically a strawman resulting from an argument from ignorance it’s to be expected.

I wouldn’t have to make one if you would give me your own description.

TRANSLATION: I don’t have to make up completely wrong a weak arguments I can call silly so I can puff out my chest thinking it makes me look smart. Even though it’s been explained to me a hundred times and I’ve even cited a few documentaries I’d rather keep drudging up nonsense.

I bet my strawman for you will be as good or better than your own articulated belief concerning origins (which is why none of you atheists have dared to post one yet.)

YOUTUBE: The Origin of life made easy

Why is science looking into origins? Are they obsessed with it?

Science or SCIENTISTS? Try to keep that straight.

I was giving Duane a hard time and referencing his use of “science” in his earlier post, so talk to him about that.

Poke fun at other posters in their own posts. It makes no sense in others. Also it’s rather petty.

But seriously, that is the crux of the debate; where did we come from? Did no one or someone create us from the elements? Did no one or someone create the elements from nothing?

Again we don’t know YET. I think I’ve already answered this. However, to simply insert God is proving you have little more than a God of the gaps. As we understand more and more that gap is getting smaller and smaller. Even if the other side simply were to admit they just don’t know and may never know doesn’t mean what your belief despite evidence (or with evidence but as YECs have shown an utter lack in any understanding of what they are looking at) becomes the right one. There could be hundreds if not thousands of possibilities.

You don’t know, but it certainly wasn’t God right, I’ve heard you say that before.

Really? Where? Where did I WRITE that? I like this argument because it’s simply getting old. Rather than there not being evidence for GOD DID IT scientists are simply ignoring it right?

Why not try actually digging up some evidence for this stuff. You know something other than “it looks all complicated, therefore GOD” or “I don’t get it and obviously no one else ever will therefore GOD”.

I think it has been sufficiently demonstrated that not only is it improbable that life, matter, energy, and the laws of physics came into existence from nothing and no one, but that it is categorically impossible that such a thing could have ever happened.

Where? The only thing you’ve presented are fallacious arguments. However, I do like that you used the word IMPROBABLE. I let you think that one over.

This leaves you 2 options; Willful ignorance or becoming a creationist. There’s no other option.

Now this is just getting sad.

And yes, the claim of Jesus being the Creator is adequately supported in the Bible.

And the fallacious arguments continue.

However, the magic space monkey thing is actually a pretty good alternative to your rock-to-human theory

Kenneth Tyner said “When God divided the light from darkness, he established the boundary in which light can travel. For biblical evidence that space is not a vacuum:” “The medium of space is “water”, a clear fluid substance. Possibly a superfluid form of hydrogen.”

Ah here we go. If the Bible says so, then It’s right, regardless if observation and evidence go against it. So am I to take it that everything you’ve said about Physics, that is also so completely wrong, you got from the Bible. The Bible is not a science textbook, and certainly not a physics textbook.

Definition of a vacuum from wordiq.com: In physics, a vacuum is the absence of matter in a volume of space.

I think if the medium of space was water, we would know about it by now. For one, you could see it if it was that abundant in space, second, you can see hydrogen clouds in space, thridly, have a look at some pictures of space, not all of it is filled with hydrogen clouds, therefore you’re wrong. The majority of space is made up of something called dark matter. We haven’t seen it directly but we can see its effects on galaxies so we know it’s there. Unfortunately that’s all we know, hence the name dark matter, but hey we’re working on it. This is what the LHC is for.

Or you could just say the devil is tricking you by making you not see it when it really is there. Although I don’t think any of the other 7 billion people on the planet would be able to see it either. And if I were an athiest (I’m not an athiest, I’m just not a creationist), regardless of what the devil did, if I didn’t believe in God, I wouldn’t believe in the devil, so how could I possibly think that the devil would trick me, if to me, he didn’t exist. But you what, I prayed God would open my eyes when I looked at pictures from the Southern Observatory, and guess what, still no hydrogen cloud filling up every space. Does that make me not believe in God? No, because for me Jesus rising from the dead is the most important factor in my faith, not taking a literal meaning of Genesis.

Although, I should probably give a bit of credit to Kenneth Tyner, if the medium of space were water, which it isn’t, observation has already shown that, then actually the speed of light would be slowed down, because light slows down when it is going through water. Actually, that would make the Universe older, not younger. Oops. Sorry Kenneth.

********** Duane says, “If we still believed as you, we wouldn’t have medicine, space exploration, or any advance we enjoy today. We had a time when your ilk ruled and it was known as the Dark Ages.” ********** Duane should brush up on his history – concerning the contributions to the world made by Bible Believers. Here are some examples, #1 Johannes Gutenberg The inventor of the Printing Press. Who’s stated goal was to mass produce THE BIBLE. Gutenberg said about his press, “Yes, it is a press, certainly, but a press from which shall flow in inexhaustible streams, the most abundant and most marvelous liquor that has ever flowed to relieve the thirst of men! Through it, God will spread His Word. A spring of truth shall flow from it: like a new star it shall scatter the darkness of ignorance, and cause a light heretofore unknown to shine amongst men.” #2 Galileo According to Wikipedia, “Galileo has been called the “father of modern observational astronomy”, the “father of modern physics”, the “father of science”, and “the Father of Modern Science”. Galileo is famous for his battle with the Catholic Church (over the sun being the center of the solar system). But Galileo believed in God, science, and the Bible. And said as much when he stated, “God is known by nature in his works, and by doctrine in his revealed word.” #3 Sir Isaac Newton From Wikipedia, “Sir Isaac Newton … was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, and is considered by many scholars and members of the general public to be one of the most influential people in human history.” Huh? A physicist, an astronomer, a mathmetician, and … A theologian? Yes, a theologian. The man who discovered the Law of Gravity was a theolgian who believed the Bible. Two examples, In “System of Physics” Newton said, “God is essential to the nature and absoluteness of space”. In “Principia” he stated, “The most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion on an intelligent and powerful Being.”

“a red wagon and an airplane Both are form of transportation. Same designer? Cats and Dogs Both have 4 legs. Same designer? Nope. Different kinds so it must be a different designer a rose and a coyote I’ll let you field this one.”

There are lots of humans in this earth and we neither know all things nor can do all things, if we could, there would just have been one designer. And talking about analogies, let me tell you something. Look at the tables, the majority of them have 4 legs, same designer? no, but its the best way because it has support from all important sides. Human and apes, they have some similar qualities, like types of teeth (because they’re useful for what they’re needed as they are), but we were designed for what we would do, like our spinal cord, ours is atached to the base of our skull because we walk up right, the ape’s is atached to the back, because he uses his 4 extremities to walk, so, as he has to see to the front, his spinal cord is atached in the back of the skull. And let me answer your analogies, is the wagon used to fly? then why should it have the same designer if the designer wasn’t qualified for that job? God is qualified to do mammals as to make reptiles, as to make birds, etc. Cats and dogs have the same designer eventhough you think they don’t, look, if you’d have been God, would you have made a world full of cats? or dogs? then why would God make a world with only 1 specie if he could make thousands? and the rose and the coyote, God created ALL THINGS, would you like a world with just animals? how would we survive without plants? God is almighty, allpowerful and he’s more inteligent than us, so, why would you think he’d limit to do just animals? he knows what’s convenient to us, he made this world to us, if not, we’d have been created in the same day as animals, but we weren’t, we’re unique because we can understand far behond any other creature and we were specially created to live and survive and to have a free will. You can think whatever you want about creation, but there’s nothing more logical than that. You can’t even think of a different color that already exists, why? because our mind is limited. God is infinite and we can’t comprehend it 100%, because we haven’t experienced something like that. We can’t finish to understand God’s marvelous works, not even after thousands of years of research and thinking. How can we understand it if we’re limited? God wants us to discover new things, to enjoy nature and all that he created, there’s no better explanation, because, or it was God or it was nothing, so, what was it? I’ll let you answer that question, and before you answer, just think about the first law of thermodinamics and you’ll see that the only possible of the two is God, for from nothing comes nothing except God acts upon it, just as inertia, an object wouldn’t change direction, speed or anything unless an external force acts upon it. Have a nice day.

If you have a question, comment or someting else, please mail me at sirarkdavid@hotmail.com. (I don’t answer nonsense messages)

“We don’t know what created everything. What we did was chuck your fairytale and start from scratch.”

So you don’t know what created everything, but you’re certain it wasn’t God. You acknowledge the complexity of the universe and all things therein. You observe today that life can’t spring into existence from non-living matter, and matter cannot spring into existence from nothing. You observe that all things tend toward randomness and chaos. You observe all these things but you believe the very opposite happened naturally without any purpose, forethought or planning, and you have ZERO evidence to support it. The following process, I believe, is how you have arrived at your conclusion; 1.) I hate the idea of an all-powerful God who is running the world like it is being ran. Those that claim to know Him are no better than anyone else, and in fact are worse than atheists. 2.) Therefore, He does not exist. 3.) Everything must have come into existence by natural processes being guided by the laws of physics. 4) The laws physics came from from.. well, they came from nowhere also.. or, we’ll figure that out later, it’s not important.

Am I close? Will you just re-examine or reconsider your original starting point of hating God and mistaking hypocrites for true children of God? If you fix step one, the rest will fall into place for you. You see, creationists observe everything I mentioned earlier and see the necessity of an Eternal God, who created the heavens and the earth will purpose, forethought, and planning. You’re hoping that “science” will figure it all out later, but you are sadly mistaken. It is like Jack Napper said (I can’t believe I’m agreeing with him, let alone quoting him) “The more we learn the more we learn that we don’t know.” And that’s the way the infinite God is not only are He and His creation beyond what we know, He’s beyond our ability to ever fully know or understand. We will not even be able to plumb the depths of God in eternity. The more knowledge we gain, the more we realize we don’t know much at all. What other choice do you have but to trust the Lord, who knows all and has it all under control?

This classical “argument from ignorance” and “God of the Gaps”. The universe is too complicated for me to understand, therefore God. I don’t know how this all started, therefore God. Because I was born and raised in a country that is predominately Christian, I believe it was MY God. Because I belong to a small subset that doesn’t understand allegory and ancient mythology, I believe what my Holy Book says literally, despite all evidence (which I ignore or rationalize) to the contrary no matter how irrational it sounds. Because there are gaps in the knowledge that even scientists admit to, therefore God.

But I don’t hate God. God is a fictional character. I hate him the same what I might hate Darth Vader. In the words of Dawkins, “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.” This God is not worth my worship even if He DID exist.

But let’s go into this deeper. How am I certain is wasn’t God? Same way I know it wasn’t Thor or Zeus, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. It’s a silly suggestion. Why is your ancient mythology the least bit relevant in any discussion of the nature of reality? The proper answer to a question of something we don’t know is, “I don’t know.” Then we look into it. We might not get answers as comprehensive as you desire. Some questions might never be answered. What we can’t do is blindly insert a magical concept into the gaps of our knowledge. That is not an answer but is the end of inquiry. God did it might have been good enough for ancient peoples but we now have a better understanding about our universe and that includes knowing that we don’t know some things. This is not a weakness of science but one of its strengths. It shows us where we need to look and it prevents the arrogance of religion that thinks it has all the answers.

You keep saying that, but the huge difference is that we believe Someone (as opposed to no one) used the dust as a building block to make Adam. You deride us for believing that God used Adam’s rib to make Eve, but don’t you find it interesting that the human rib will regenerate itself if removed as long as the periosteum is left intact. Did the poor, ignorant, superstitious Bible writers just get lucky on that? or were they doing rib removals back then while leaving the periosteum in place and observing the regrowth? What do you think? There’s another question for you; How could evolution explain the rib regeneration? Were every one of our anscestors having their ribs ripped out (while leaving the periosteum in place) and the one that was able to re-grow the rib survived to reproduce?

What are you talking about??? How many times must I point out that you are projecting. “As opposed to no one”? WE DO NOT BELIEVE “NO ONE” USED DUST AS A BUILDING BLOCK. That is YOUR belief, which you keep projecting, with the removal of God, as our belief. And are you saying that if you take a rib, you can grow a whole new person (of the opposite sex) from it??? There’s a HUGE difference between a bone healing itself and growing a whole new person. And “Did the poor, ignorant, superstitious Bible writers just get lucky on that? or were they doing rib removals back then while leaving the periosteum in place and observing the regrowth?” And this is in the Bible where? It wasn’t until 1543 when Vesalius proved men didn’t have one less rib than women. Once again, you are assuming stuff not in the Bible. Like the justifications for all the errors and contradictions. Every excuse I’ve ever heard is a fanciful scenario completely made up with no Historical or Biblical justification except to avoid embarrassment.

“I hate to tell you this, but most Christians have enough common sense to know these stories are allegories. Only a small group of the more naive ones take the whole book as literal truth, and they are rightly mocked.”

I don’t take the entire Bible literally. However, I take it to be entirely true. There are some passages that are even stated by the Bible to be figurative and allegorical, but the Genesis account has no hint of figurative language. It has real, literal people that have several ancient lineages traced directly to them. It is obviously meant to be interpreted literally. It is only when you believe in millions of years that you have to interpret it symbolically. The serpent (Satan) did speak with Eve, but that doesn’t mean he looked exactly like the serpents that we have today. God cursed the serpent to go on his belly and eat dust the rest of the time, so there was apparently some change there. The Bible just doesn’t say exactly what the creature looked like that spoke to Eve. So you can’t just say, “I know what snakes look like today, and they certainly can’t talk, so the whole thing is nonsense!”

You can read Genesis and NOT conclude it was figurative? What with the tree with the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil and the talking snake? That doesn’t sound even the least bit figurative to you? And as for the lineages, they don’t trace to individuals, they trace to entire tribes (Canaan, Israel, etc.). So even that needs to be taken with an idea that it was meant to be metaphorical. Genesis is not even the oldest book in the Bible. It was handed down as oral folklore until it was finally recorded during the Babylonian exile. Those lineages are mythical histories of the tribes as remembered after centuries. Archeology is uncovering the true history of Israel and it doesn’t look good for the accuracy of the Bible. Pretty much NOTHING that happened prior to the Babylonian exile can be counted on as actual history. There was no Exodus, Jews were never slaves of Egypt, etc. They didn’t take over the promised lands one kingdom at a time within the lifetimes of any individual, let alone nonsense like Noahide floods. Your book is no more accurate than any mythology, nor more revelatory than a horoscope. It is riddled with anachronisms, geographical errors, internal conflicts, distortions and questionable moralities. We are relying on copies of copies of translations of copies in ancient obsolete languages describing events with no concept of verification or even follow up. A Holy Book meant to be a revelation from God would not read like something written by a patriarchal bronze age society and open to the widest interpretation by its readers. A real God would know this and would not have put out a book that can justify ANYTHING the reader wants to justify. It’s an interesting bit of literature that is unique in that it was preserved as well as it was, and it gives us insight into an ancient culture, but it is not the END ALL BE ALL of how to live in modern society. Christianity was dragged kicking and screaming into the modern age thanks to the advances of secular culture.

“Christianity is a con that uses classic brainwashing techniques. You degrade the person’s character and esteem until they are at the bottom, only to lift them again in the warming glow of Jesus.”

Degrading people? Not any more than an oncologist is “degrading” someone by diagnosing their cancer. Doctor: “You have a cancer that is killing you from within and it will surely claim your life if nothing is done about it.” Patient: “How degrading and judgmental of you!” We just speak the truth, Duane, which is sometimes hard to hear, but it will be better for the person in the long run.

Religion gives people a disease and offers them the cure. You are a horrible sinner. We can save you. You can only go to Heaven if you believe our story. We can offer you eternal life. It’s the oldest scam in history. God is the ultimate authority, and I speak for God, so you must believe me…and give me your money.

“Law of Information The what!?! I think you are referring to DembskiÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Ã¢â‚¬Å“Law of Conservation of InformationÃ¢â‚¬Â which was shown to be WRONG!!!! ”

Law of Information – Information always has an intelligent source.

DNA repair systems – A sytems designed to maintain the integrity of another system. That is strong “evidence for” intelligent design !

DNA…. information capacity (2mm diameter sphere full of DNA has a similar capacity to that of 4 million x 1 terrabyte HDDs) – That’s information density well beyond even todays computing technology by a high factor .

Because it is “observable” evidence, it is far stronger evidence than say the fossil evidence for common descent.

“The BBC is correct not to include the non-scientific ideas of the average American [insert cliche statistic of the ignorance of the average American].”

Evolutionism and Creationism are philsophical ideas of origins. The programme was more history & ideas than science. BBC = British Broadcasting Corporation – Its not for/about Americans.

Stephen wrote: The world appears to be exactly like His Word says 6000 years old and destroyed by a worldwide flood 4400 years ago. #### Geno: Except for all those radioisotope dates; our ability to directly observe objects much more than 6000 years from Earth; the absence of a global flood layer; a source of water (that wouldn’t cook all life); and a way to get rid of the water.

The thing is that animals, or any living organism will be forced to change it’s diet if the environment does not produce the food anymore.

Yep and many many many would die off unless they had a mutation which allowed them to process the nutrients needed. I’m sure you believe the guides at the Petersburg, Kentucky Creation Museum that the T-Rex’s teeth were for cracking open coconuts too.

In the past the fruit were yielding much more nutrients than now. Just imagine how good a fruit would have been in the garden of Eden or even just after the fall.

Got any evidence to support this or just making baseless assertions? The fact is that many food plants have been selectively bread by humans. From corn to oranges. Get your facts straight.

Isn’t it strange that the male mosquito has exactly the same deadly tools as the female, however is it used to suck blood, or is it used to draw the juices from plants?

Both. Next time pick up an encyclopedia.

Now take this in considiration: If the mosquito female could suck juice from a fruit and it would sustain her and the offspring, then God in the first place didn’t create a blood sucking insect.

Apparently you haven’t heard of this thing call an ENCYCLOPEDIA. Here let me help you out…

Two important events in the life of female mosquitoes are egg development and blood digestion. After taking a blood meal the midgut of the female synthesizes proteolytic enzymes that hydrolyze the blood proteins into free amino acids. These are used as building blocks for the synthesis of egg yolk proteins.

But it was because of mans fall that the whole creaton has gone into a downward spiral from there.

And the baseless fallacious nonsense continues. None of this is established but spewed as fact.

Now the only thing that provides enough nutrients for the female mosquito and her offspring is blood

facepalm

In many parts of the world we have wintessed organisms change their diets to adapt to new environments.

Yep and many many die off as a result. That is unless you can provide some examples of this night and day switching with no ill effects. What is the term for such selective pressure where organism more adept to changes in their environment are more likely to survive???? Oh the world may never know.

Yes this is God’s creation, but it is a watered down perverted version of the one God first created, and is it God’s fault. no it is mans own fault.

I can tell where the Moon is by looking at the height of the tide. Is that information?

I can tell which way is north by looking at the direction old chimney stacks lean. Is that information?

I can tell what time of year it is by looking out of the window. Is that information?

DNA. information capacity (2mm diameter sphere full of DNA has a similar capacity to that of 4 million x 1 terrabyte HDDs)

Much of which appears not to have any purpose. Some design.

– That’s information density well beyond even todays computing technology by a high factor . Because it is “observable” evidence, it is far stronger evidence than say the fossil evidence for common descent.

So, contrary to some of your fellow posters, you admit that fossil evidence is evidence for common descent.

DNA repair systems A sytems designed to maintain the integrity of another system. That is strong “evidence for” intelligent design !

Assertion is not evidence.

DNA. information capacity (2mm diameter sphere full of DNA has a similar capacity to that of 4 million x 1 terrabyte HDDs) – That’s information density well beyond even todays computing technology by a high factor .

So what?

Because it is “observable” evidence, it is far stronger evidence than say the fossil evidence for common descent.

Fossils are more than “observable” they are actually observable.

On one hand we have something that does not exist , an assertion and a non sequitur. On the other, physical fossils.

BBC = British Broadcasting Corporation Its not for/about Americans.

Exactly. So therefor what crackpot idea is popular in the Bible Belt of the USA is not relevant to a proper intellectual program.

Stephen wrote: The world appears to be exactly like His Word says 6000 years old and destroyed by a worldwide flood 4400 years ago. #### Geno: Except for all those radioisotope dates; our ability to directly observe objects much more than 6000 years from Earth; the absence of a global flood layer; a source of water (that wouldn’t cook all life); and a way to get rid of the water. #####

Hi Geno,

I could list about 4 times as many evidences for a young earth, but you have already heard them. You have more evidence for a young earth/ universe than an old one, but you choose to believe in millions of years, so that is what you defend.

Do you still believe that the radioisotope dating is accurate? I think me and you have hashed this out before; there is simply too much inconsistency in those tests and too many questionable assumptions utilized therein to put any trust in radiometric dating at all. There is just no way to check it for accuracy, and when we try to test it with rocks of known age, it produces wildly over-estimated dates. It is like listening to these guys who have predicted the exact date for the end of the world several times and were always wrong, but then believing them if they said it was going to end in the year 3035 it is the same concept except going the other direction in time.

We’ve also been through the starlight thing before as well, which is based on the speed of light in a vacuum. We discussed the different scenarios where the speed of light varies and that ‘meters’ and ‘seconds’ (the units of measurement for the speed of light) can, themselves, vary. I did concede that your assumption was not an unreasonable one if we assume the speed has always been the same, and that the stars were formed at that same distance, and that the distance is, in fact, billions of light years away. However, I think that it can be explained… Did you ever finish Jason Lisle’s paper on Anisotropic Synchrony? I think last time you said you hadn’t.

Global flood layer? Are you saying that there should be one layer that shows evidence of a global flood? The layers are all from the flood. We know fossilization is rare, yet we have billions of fossils all over the world that appear to have been buried alive, or buried dead, but with their bodies intact. We have fossils that go through many of these layers that supposedly differ in age by millions of years; how does that fact alone not disprove the theory that the layers are different ages? One more thing to think about; What do we observe today? Do we normally have trouble with erosion of the earth or building up of the earth? The rain, rivers, wind, etc. all seem to be eroding the layers and washing them into the ocean. So, did the millions of years of eroding and washing away of these layers produce the layers? With the exception of a volcano or a mudslide, usually the ground is eroded, not added upon. That is why you have the buildup of sediment at the mouths of rivers… the soil is gradually being taken to the oceans.

On a different note; you claim to be a Christian, right? Do you think that having Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior is necessary for anyone to be made right with God? Do you believe people will be eternally separated from God if Jesus Christ does not forgive their sins? If so, why have I never once seen you write to these atheists that you side with and tell them about their need of the Savior? Do you think it is more important for John Bebbington and the like to believe on Jesus Christ, or for them to believe the earth is millions of years old. Do you care one whit for these atheists eternal souls, or would you rather attack those who are living their lives in defense of the Creator? What is your mission in life, Geno? to tell people about the beauties of Christ and His gospel, or to cause people to doubt what the Bible plainly says? Jesus told Nicodemus, who was a master of Israel, that except a man be born again, he cannot even see the kingdom of God (John 3). Geno, has there ever been a time in your life when you were born of the spirit and when you came to trust in Jesus finished work on the cross alone as your only means of acceptance with God the Father, or do you hold some form of self-righteousness to God and hope that it will be enough? You sound like a decent person, but after listening to you over these months, I am troubled for your soul. I believe you can be saved and still believe that the earth is millions of years old, but if Christ, His gospel, and His kingdom are not preeminent in your life, I pray that you would ask the Lord to show you the condition of your eternal soul . I don’t mean “are you Christian in name?” or “do you go to church and believe in God?” for the devils believe in God, and the Bible says that many who call themselves Christians will be cast into outer darkness for eternity(Matt 7). I’m asking you, “Is Christ more to you than your family, friends, and even your own life?” I know you know the right answers to these questions, but what is actually true in your own heart and life? My opinion and the opinion of those that read our stuff mean very little what does the Lord KNOW to be true?

2Cor 13:5 Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?

May truth and the Holy Spirit have absolute sway in both of our hearts and minds, and may we not be deceived by ourselves or anyone else, to the glory of Jesus Christ. With sincerity, Stephen

Also, thank you for your service to our country as you mentioned in a thread a while back. God has used men like you to give us this freedom to discuss things like this openly without fear. It is much appreciated.

I wrote: “You criticise Eric for not understanding your beliefs in one breath and then completely misrepresent his beliefs in the next.”

You wrote: “How are we misrepresenting the logic of Eric’s arguments?”

Nice side-step. Your actual post was: “But if God did create the mosquito we have to ask ourselves what he has got against those millions of poor children who live in hot countries and die each year from malaria.”

This implies God created the mosquito (and the malaria pathogen) with the intention of inflicting misery and death. This misrepresents the Genesis account in which God describes creation as ‘very good’ and death only entered after creation was complete and Adam sinned. You know as well as I do that anything that misrepresents the Genesis account misrepresents Eric’s beliefs.

Then you wrote: “Also, Mark, please explain the naturalistic mechanism by which Adam’s disobedience (before he became acquainted with the knowledge of good and evil) caused fruit-eating female mosquitos to mutate into blood-sucking child killers because I don’t know of it and no creationist has ever seen fit to try to explain it.”

I could give it a go but I wasn’t there when it happened, so, with the only actual scientific evidence being the mosquito in its current form, all I could do is make up a historical narrative involving mutations and natural selection, throw in a few scientific terms and point to a couple of fossils.

I doubt you would find this kind of pseudo-scienctific explanation very satisfactory. I certainly don’t.

“To Stephen Holshouser. You asked what we’d do if we faced your God. I treated this as a hypothetical, answered your question, and asked in return what you would do if you faced OTHER Gods. You replied: “There are no other Gods” Fine, when you asked me about facing YOUR God, I might as well have simply have replied “Your God doesn’t exist”. If that’s the level of discussion you want, there you go.”

You left out the step where you asked me what I would do if brought before Allah. I answered the question for you. Did you like my answer? I’m sorry if it sounded like I was just avoiding the question regarding other gods after you questioned me about Allah and I replied, I thought you were going to go through a whole list of other gods and what I would say.

So, I will go back to your question and address it a bit more;

“And are you claiming that ANY God would let you into its heaven, no matter which God it is?”

No, I am not claiming that. Your question was only concerning Allah and the Quran, so I answered accordingly. However, if there were any other Holy, Almighty, All-knowing,God, hypothetically speaking, and there was no mediator between myself and that God, and I had to be judged only by my actions, I would not make it into that heaven. Now, to expound on why I believe there are no other gods; For this universe to exist and for our minds and bodies to be as glorious as they are, there had to be a Master-Designer One with infinite power and wisdom to create the laws of physics and every atom while continuing to hold them in place, One existing outside of time and space in order to bring it all into existence, One doing these things with forethought and purpose to bring about a desired plan. By definition, there can only be one that is MOST-powerful, that would be the Creator of all, the Most-High God, the superlative God. You don’t even need to crack a Bible to look around and see that He is brilliant and powerful beyond imagination.

You continued with; “Then I said “My view is that any reasonable God would judge all of us on our actions”, to which you replied, “Have you been reading the Bible? That’s what He says He’s going to do.” In that case, as a good person, I have nothing to fear from your God. If you think YOU are a bad person, then that is for you to worry about.”

By what standard are you judging yourself as “good” Andrew? I don’t doubt you are a “good” person by this world’s standard; nevertheless, you are wicked, vile and repulsive in the eyes of a Holy God. If I could take your thoughts from the time you were born until now, let alone your deeds, and put them on video for everyone to see, you would spend every ounce of your energy trying to keep anyone from seeing it. You’ve had such vile thoughts, that you would not even dare tell your closest friend. You would have to go into hiding if we could see into your heart, my friend. I know that because the Bible says it (Romans 3:9-18, Jeremiah 17:9, Genesis 6:5) and because I also am a human like yourself. There is no one that does not fit this description. You, Andrew, have the potential inside yourself right now to make Mao Zedong look like an angel, if not for the restraining grace of God upon you. Man is far from good. We are fallen, wicked, sinful, and love every minute of it and that is sugar coating it.

No, you are NOT good Andrew, and you would justly be cast into everlasting darkness if you died today without Jesus Christ as your Savior. If I did not care about you, I wouldn’t bother telling you any of this. Would you finish reading Romans chapter 3 to see what the purpose of the law is and who has satisfied it? Our forgiveness and righteousness can only come by way of the sinless, perfect Son of God. You see, no greater love can be shown to someone than Someone else willingly dying in their place. And that is the gospel; Jesus Christ became man to be able to suffer death for our sin and to fulfill the law on our behalf, so that we might be reconciled to our Holy and Just Creator, and be restored to fellowship with Him. Jesus did this while we were His enemies (Romans 5:6-8). I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t die for my enemies but God loved sinners like us enough to do just that.

You continued with; “Stephen H: “He doesn’t actively harden anyone’s heart.” Hmm, have YOU been reading the bible, Stephen? Try Exodus 10:20. “But the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go.” If you get this simple thing wrong, how can I trust you know anything about this book at all?”

You know I knew about that passage because I mentioned it in the post.. go back and look. My point was that for God to harden Pharaoh’s heart, all He had to do was let Pharaoh do exactly what he wanted. You can spoil your kids by just letting them do what they want and not administering to them discipline or correction. You are not necessarily actively doing something to spoil your children, but rather withholding good parenting. So, in the same way, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart by letting him continue at will. Ex 9:34 And when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunders were ceased, he sinned yet more, and hardened his heart, he and his servants. Ex 10:1 And the LORD said unto Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh: for I have hardened his heart, and the heart of his servants, that I might shew these my signs before him:

God allowed this so He could demonstrate His power (Romans 9). He has the might and right to do things like that, which is probably why most people hate Him… because they don’t get to run the show. It is the same with us; we come into this world condemned and unbelieving already (John 3). If God, does not have mercy on us, we will perish, and rightly so. If He gives us what we want, we have no hope.

I think my last post to you was a bit confusing the way I cut and pasted from our previous discussions. It looked like I was asking the same questions again when I was really just adding old context. Sorry about that.

Jack: “It comes from everywhere and much of it is all around us. Heck, hydrogen is the most common element in the universe. Did all the hydrogen on the Earth get here only when it was forming? NO.”

Stephen: Thanks for clearing that up for me. ______________________________________________________

Stephen: But seriously, that is the crux of the debate; where did we come from? Did no one or someone create us from the elements? Did no one or someone create the elements from nothing?

Jack: “Again we don’t know YET. I think I’ve already answered this. However, to simply insert God is proving you have little more than a God of the gaps. As we understand more and more that gap is getting smaller and smaller. Even if the other side simply were to admit they just don’t know and may never know doesn’t mean what your belief despite evidence (or with evidence but as YECs have shown an utter lack in any understanding of what they are looking at) becomes the right one. There could be hundreds if not thousands of possibilities.”

Stephen: The Lord is not a “God of the gaps.” He’s the God of all that we know to be true and all that we have understaning about as well. He upholds all the laws of nature right now and by His power, the universe remains in existence. Colossians 1:12-20. ________________________________________________________

Stephen: You don’t know, but it certainly wasn’t God right, I’ve heard you say that before.

Jack: “Really? Where? Where did I WRITE that? I like this argument because it’s simply getting old. Rather than there not being evidence for GOD DID IT scientists are simply ignoring it right? Why not try actually digging up some evidence for this stuff. You know something other than “it looks all complicated, therefore GOD” or “I don’t get it and obviously no one else ever will therefore GOD”.”

Stephen: You know, your “we know it wasn’t poofed into existence by the magic man” statements. Just recently, you admitted to me about not knowing about origins and that that was called intellectual honesty. I’ll go back and cut and paste if you want, but this is what I was referring to. Science(scientists) has/have shown that it CANNOT happen on its own, not that it is just improbable, extremely rare, or that we just haven’t figured it out yet. Like turning lead into gold; it’s not that we just haven’t figured it out how to do it yet, it’s that it simply cannot be done. ____________________________________________________________

Jack: “Again not my “theory” but you’ve proven one thing. You’re deluded…. …And you prove you haven’t even an elementary science level understanding of any field everytime you punch a key on the keyboard. The very fact that you think that these materials were “always there” during this period or that they all must have seeped from the solid matter is just plain laughable. You keep going on about how you are not a geologist but it’s your poor understanding of chemistry that is cause for concern. Leave geology out of it. You seem to wanna confuse the two. Though give the typical Creationists need to lump sciences it’s not surprising.”

Stephen: And you think I’m petty? When I watch your youtube later, Lord willing, will that be the theory that you believe to be true or at least possible; yes or no?

Consider that neither one of us will be here to debate this in about seventy short years. Where do you believe you will be at that time? Do you believe you have a soul or a spirit that continues after you die? or are you just meaningless, purposeless, temporarily combined chemicals?

Duane said: “This classical “argument from ignorance” and “God of the Gaps”. The universe is too complicated for me to understand, therefore God. I don’t know how this all started, therefore God.”

Stephen: It isn’t that we don’t know how it happened, it is that it has been shown that it COULD NOT have happened on its own.

Duane: “But I don’t hate God. God is a fictional character.”

Stephen: See, you’re at step 2 again already.

Duane: “But let’s go into this deeper. How am I certain is wasn’t God? Same way I know it wasn’t Thor or Zeus, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. It’s a silly suggestion.”

Stephen: Does anyone claim that they created the world? It isn’t suggested that any of them did. Again, the Lord is not a “God of the gaps,” He is the Sovereign over all things, known and unknown. Colossians 1:12-20. Zeus is more believable than “everything from nothing by natural processes”.

Duane: “And are you saying that if you take a rib, you can grow a whole new person (of the opposite sex) from it???”

Stephen: Not a problem for the One who spoke the universe into existence. You still didn’t address the questions about the rib. Why did they say that God used Adam’s rib to make Eve?

Duane: “And as for the lineages, they don’t trace to individuals, they trace to entire tribes (Canaan, Israel, etc.).”

Stephen: Go back and read the lineages in the beginning of the gospels. They go back from Jesus thru Mary’s line and Joseph’s all the way to Adam himself and then God (not to an ape-like creature, btw.) Your knowledge of the Bible, its transmission process and its historical and archeological accuracy seem to be severely lacking and biased. If you are genuinely interested in a study to find the truth of the matter, I will be glad to help you out, but if you are just interested in repeating what some dyed-in-the-wool God-hater spewed out, then there’s nothing I can do for you.

Duane: “Religion gives people a disease and offers them the cure. You are a horrible sinner. We can save you. You can only go to Heaven if you believe our story.”

Stephen: Do you really, honestly believe yourself to be a good person at heart, Duane? If so, what standard are you going by?

Just to remind you; God is still being patient with you, and giving you life and breath. He still commands you to repent and accept His terms of surrender. He is merciful even to those that hate Him. Could you ever really love or do good to people that hated and despised you? Would you ever even offer them forgiveness?

It appears that John B and Geno can’t avoid straw man arguments and the mockery of things they simply don’t understand.

I think we would all agree that space is considered a “pressure” vacuum. That however does not equate to a “material” vacuum. Without the atmospheric pressure we find on earth, there will not be a compression of the fluid medium of space as compared to our oceans under pressure. Therefore, you should not expect to see resistance in space as you would on earth.

This is further born out in the fact that objects are weightless in space.

I could give it a go but I wasn’t there when it happened, so, with the only actual scientific evidence being the mosquito in its current form, all I could do is make up a historical narrative involving mutations and natural selection, throw in a few scientific terms and point to a couple of fossils.

I doubt you would find this kind of pseudo-scienctific explanation very satisfactory. I certainly don’t.

So you have no naturalistic theory to explain how Adam’s sin caused mutations in insects thus changing a non-mosquito into a speciated mosquito. I thought that might be the case.

By what standard are you judging yourself as “good” Andrew? I don’t doubt you are a “good” person by this world’s standard; nevertheless, you are wicked, vile and repulsive in the eyes of a Holy God.

Hi, I am fourteen, and ever since I have been watching the Creation Today Show, I have been able to tell my friends why the evolution side is wrong, and to give them facts against it. I am a strong believer in Christ and I go to a Calvary Chapel Bible College in Italy. Thank you for all you have done. Praying for you!

I go to a community college. I ran into your ministry because in archaeology, they were teaching about radio carbon dating and to be honest, I started questioning the Bible, specifically Genesis.

I did a YouTube search and found your ministry. Wow! It was literally a life-changing moment. Thank you for being confident in God’s Word and never backing down on that. Never give up preaching God’s truth!

I have been a Christian a long while, but something through your teaching just broke me — maybe broke my pride. I made a commitment to lay down my life and stop trying to live in my strength. I finally realized how amazingly awesome our God is, and how deserving He is of all our worship. He is the sole source of our faith and the only means of our justification. Thank you so much for sharing with us!

California

- Jennie

A dear 74 year old saint of God, James, went home to Heaven in July. James watched some of our resources, and as a result, he trusted Christ as Savior. James was a janitor at a church. In his will, he named Creation Today as one of eight ministries to which he wanted his earthly belongings to go. How humbling it was to speak to his sister who called us to say that it wouldn’t be a lot of money, but that it was very important to her brother Jimmy that this donation be completed to Creation Today. Praise the Lord! Jimmy finished his race and is now with Jesus!

California

- Virginia

A widow of 73 years of age named Mary feels called to a specific mission field. This dear saint of God has used her Social Security to buy two duplication towers to duplicate The Creation Seminar. She said her mission field is the state of Oklahoma. She has determined in her heart to reach that state for Jesus with creation resources!